


way before i knew you

by fleury



Category: Tiny Meat Gang (Band)
Genre: Growing Up, Internalized Homophobia, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-31 02:35:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19416709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fleury/pseuds/fleury
Summary: Cody thinks about Noel’s mouth more than he should.He says, “you’ve got something on your lip,” and they’re both drunk. Both of them with too much in their system, but his face burns and he wishes he could take it back.





	way before i knew you

**Author's Note:**

> i’ll be honest with you! i had no idea this tag even existed until a few hours ago and god.....what a gold mine
> 
> edit 6/30/19 de-anon'd :)

Boys are not raised to be soft. 

Cody grows up quiet. He tries not to speak when he is not spoken to. 

He’s got a sister. He would give his life to keep her safe and still, he feels like a coward around others. Shorter, smaller, his hair is longer. He gets it cut. 

Part of him feels trapped and scared and alone and.

His dad says, “chin up, alright, buddy?” That’s the part of him that feels okay. 

Cody breathes. In. Out.

+

People are awful. 

Cody’s fifteen. He hears things. It’s high school, it’s other teenagers, it’s the same shit over and over and over. People are cruel and they’re malicious and somehow, he’s lured in like nothing. 

It starts like: Cody starts shoving a kid because he looks weird, starts picking on a kid because he’s different, picks fights just because he can. Just because that little rush of adrenaline in his veins makes his pulse spike. 

You never know what’s going to stick. What comments you make are going to latch onto someone’s skin and keep them up at night, what’s going to turn their stomach inside out and make them sick. 

Cody gets a bruise on his arm, just from getting shoved. There’s another on his leg.

Neither of them mean anything. 

His alarm clock says 2 AM. His breaths are quiet in the darkness of his room. His heart leaps into his throat and suffocates him. He called a kid, “gay,” that morning. Curled his lip up and screwed his face into a scowl, and he blurted it out like it meant nothing, like it was poison on his tongue.

Nobody thinks about it in the moment. Nobody, nobody, nobody, and Cody — everything feels wrong. 

+

It’s for the rush. It’s always for the sudden heat in his nerves and the shiver in his bones. 

It’s that and then it’s better, and say what you will, but nothing beats it. 

Just.

When Cody turns eighteen, fresh out of high school, he road trips with one of his buddies out to a beach in BC. Cody doesn’t know much about the city they’re in, or the local tourist traps, or. Anything, really, he’s clueless.

He meets another boy, though. One with curly brown hair, a gap between his front teeth, and freckles on his shoulders. 

Not long after they know each other’s names, they’re pressed together in a bathroom stall, too many drinks in each of their systems, the heat of the summer settling deep underneath his skin. 

It’s the first time Cody kisses a boy. 

The boy with curly hair breathes out, “I wanna get my mouth on you.” 

It gets swallowed up between their lips, but it’s warm on his skin, and Cody forgets how to think.

He says, “okay. Okay — yeah.” 

He watches him drop down to his knees, and he shuts his eyes as tight as he can.

+

“I have a gay friend,” one of his buddies says. Alex. His eyes are like daggers.

Cody blinks. “What?” 

Alex shakes his head. “No, I mean, you ever think about that? How some people are really gay? Before you start throwing that shit around like it’s insulting?” 

“C’mon it’s not — you know it’s not serious, man,” Cody says. 

Alex looks down at his hands. He doesn’t look up. “It’s fucked up. That’s what it is.” 

Cody’s head hurts. The room spins. His heart feels like something’s squeezing it. Hard. 

“It’s not like that.”

“Yeah, it is. It is like that.” Alex stands up. He still isn’t looking at Cody. “Fuck you, man. If you think you can really say stuff like that. _Fuck_ you.” 

Cody has a million things on the tip of his tongue that he could say. A million things to defend himself, to throw out there, but he just watches Alex leave. He tracks him the whole way out, watches until the door shuts behind him, and then he breaks. 

Cody doesn’t cry. 

But he thinks about it. He thinks about letting go, about exhaling, about letting all of this go. 

Cody doesn’t cry.

But he slams his fist against a marble countertop just to feel something again.

+

A month before he’s set to graduate, he calls his mother. 

She’s a million miles away, an entire world apart, and she says, “hi, honey.” She’s so kind, so sweet, Cody wasn’t ever taught to be like that. 

“Hey,” Cody says, and he takes another swig from the bottle in his hand just to stop his voice from shaking when he says it. When he tells her. He’s going to tell her.

She asks, “how are classes?” And Cody feels the room collapse at his feet. 

“Okay,” he says dismissively. “They’re whatever. Pretty easy, you know?”

“That’s good,” she says, sounding pleased. “We all can’t wait to come down to see you.” 

Cody can hear the smile in her voice

“Yeah,” he agrees. Quiet. He can’t. He can’t do it. He wants to kick something — kick _himself_ , because he was going to let this out. Tell someone. Explain. Just once.

There have been a few times, through the years, that Cody has thought about telling his friends, maybe. Where he’s laid awake late with them, gaming, or talking, or staring at the sky in silence and he. He never did. 

He doesn’t now. He doesn’t know when he will.

+

He meets Noel and everything clicks into place.

Noel has these light eyes and a smile with the softest edges and Cody can’t keep his eyes off. Not if he tried. He feels wrought out and pulled in a million directions. 

Noel touches his shoulder and jokes about something, something, something. Always a grin on his face, always this excited lilt in his voice. Cody feels hopeless.

+

“Hey,” Noel says, slinging an arm over Cody’s shoulder. “Wingman. You and me, tonight. This new club opened up downtown, we’re going.”

“I’m busy,” Cody protests, and tries to pull Noel’s arm off, but he just gets locked in tighter.

“ _Busy_ , yeah. Sure.” Noel scoffs. “Gonna be busy being sad and alone if you don’t come out with me tonight.” 

“That actually sounds really fine by me,” Cody says, and he tries making a face at Noel, but he’s frowning. Big and exaggerated and very full of himself. 

“That’s not even fair. You never go out with me because you hate me, I’m calling it,” Noel says, but he’s back to smiling. “I’ll pay for your drinks. All you can drink. Get your stomach pumped, I’ll pay for that, too.”

Cody blows out a breath, reluctant, but he agrees anyways.

+

“We fucking did it. Like, really did it,” Noel says, one night. They’re both laying in the grass and it’s too wet, too dark outside, too chilly, everything is all wrong but. Somehow, it’s okay.

Cody laughs out a quiet, “yeah.” He stares up at the sky. “Long way to go, buddy.” 

“Yeah,” Noel says. His voice is light. He sounds happy. “But it’s enough. For now. I’m good with this, you know?”

His fingers brush Cody’s wrist for half a second, barely long enough for it to register. 

“Yeah.” Cody keeps watching the stars. The moon. “I know what you mean.”

+

Cody thinks about Noel’s mouth more than he should. 

He says, “you’ve got something on your lip,” and they’re both drunk. Both of them with too much in their system, but his face burns and he wishes he could take it back.

Noel reaches for his lip, drags a fingers over the corner of it. “Did I get it?” 

“Yeah, yeah, you — you’re good,” he slurs. 

Noel’s mouth is pink and it’s hard to look away, sometimes. Sometimes, Cody doesn’t look away at all and when Noel catches his eye, he feels guilt settle into his stomach. Like a heavy stone, something to weigh down on him like an anchor.

It grounds him.

Then, Noel’s arm skims his, or he’ll laugh in Cody’s ear, or hold onto him, and everything falls apart just like that.

+

“Hey, you’re up,” Noel says, because Cody crashed on the couch, too drunk to drive home, too tired to last an Uber ride. 

Cody’s shoulder aches and his back hurts, but Noel brushes past him to get to the pot of coffee on the counter and he’s already smiling. 

The sunlight spilling in from the window is soft on his skin. Cody thinks he might swallow his own tongue. 

“Yeah, just thought I’d try and pull something together before dipping.” 

“Coffee’s good,” Noel says, pouring himself a cup. “And you can stay longer, man. I’ll throw something up on Netflix.” 

Cody thinks: no, no, no. Because he can’t. Not this early in the morning, not with Noel, because he has no self control. 

But.

“Sure,” he says, trying for calm. “Let’s do that.”

+

Cody wants to kiss Noel so bad that it hurts. 

He grew up wanting to kiss boys and he never quite said it, never let the words out, always kept it to himself. It took a whole lot of cheap alcohol to get that out of him, and still — it feels wrong sometimes. Thinking back. 

Cody’s dealt with enough to know what he wants.

He watches Noel and sees him watching back, the silence between them heavy and this quiet challenge in his eyes. It’s suffocating.

Neither of them speak. Neither of them say a _thing_. It only lasts half a second, but feels like hours in Cody’s head. 

Nothing happens. The moment dies. Cody’s never going to be able to get over it.

+

“Love you, man,” Cody says, when Noel brings him over another drink. It’s cold in his hand, but Cody still tenses. He feels his stomach jump. 

Noel doesn’t pause. He says, “Yeah, yeah, love you, too, fucker,” and clinks their glasses together. “No homo, right?” He’s smiling.

Cody rolls his eyes and knocks the drink back. It burns going down, but it helps clear his head. He doesn’t think, he doesn’t think, he doesn’t think, it’s better like that.

+

“Hey,” Noel says. He freezes. “I, uh. I’m pretty sure this is the most awkward thing in the world for me to ask, but can I spend the night at yours?”

Cody squints at him. “What’s wrong with your place.” 

Noel chews at the corner of his mouth. Nervous tick. Cody knows. 

“Bed bugs,” he says, and twists his mouth to the side. “It’s gross — really fucking gross.”

“ _You’re_ gross,” Cody says. He laughs. But he’s never been able to deny Noel of a single thing and he’s not about to start now.

+

Sometimes, when Cody hears his name on Noel’s tongue, he jumps. When it’s his name and not some stupid fucking nickname, or an insult, or absolutely anything, anything but his _name_. 

But it’s as simple as, “Cody,” when he’s calling him over, or talking to him, or when he’s retelling a story and he’s smiling and smiling and.

Cody feels it beneath his ribs, in his heart, and it beats for Noel, he thinks. Beats unsteady and jagged and for him. 

\+ 

The first time Cody kisses Noel, it’s terrifying. 

Cody’s brain races, through and through, a million different things all at once. 

It’s too much for him to try and describe, it’s better than anything else he’s ever done, better than winning the lottery, finishing a marathon, landing on fucking mars. It’s easy and quiet, and Noel is so, so careful, like Cody will break at any of the wrong moves.

His mouth is soft and his hand is wrapped around his waist and Cody can press into Noel’s space like it’s where he’s getting the last of his oxygen. Shamelessly asking for more and more. 

Kissing Noel is what makes him feel complete. For the first time, where he can close his eyes and breathe and everything feels _okay_. 

They end up in Noel’s room and it doesn’t go much further than kissing, but Cody still wakes up with his head on Noel’s chest, with their skin warm against each other, and it’s good. It’s so good. 

Cody can forget about everything else and he can live. He doesn’t think about anything, like the scent of Noel’s cologne in his nose, his sheets around them, the quick pitter-patter of his heart.

It’s lovely. It’s everything.

+

Cody looks at Noel and he feels sure.

He doesn’t think he’s ever felt more sure about anything in his life.


End file.
